


you were a kindness

by WonderTwinC



Category: Leverage
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-11
Updated: 2015-04-11
Packaged: 2018-03-22 07:57:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3721153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WonderTwinC/pseuds/WonderTwinC
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Seriously, Sterling?” </p>
<p>“Seriously.” - The Last Dam Job</p>
            </blockquote>





	you were a kindness

“Maggie.”

He shows up on her doorstep one day in the middle of summer - months after her divorce from Nate. He looks just as she remembers him, put together and oozing confidence that others spend their entire lives trying to fake.

It makes her smile.

“James.”

Maggie lets Jim Sterling into her newly furnished apartment, her eyes sweeping over his broad shoulders as she shuts the door behind him. There has always been something that sparks whenever Nate brought him around. A small flame that burned away in her gut as she watched him from afar, spoke to him occasionally.

That same flame seems to burn out of control as she stares at him now - taking in the familiar cut of his suit and the way he walks around her living room as if he’s been there a hundred times before. There is a small ache in her chest that she accounts to the fraction of guilt she feels at the feeling. She has only been going by her maiden name for a few months now, just since the divorce, but things had been bad before that with Nate’s drinking and Sam’s death.

She’s been lonely for more than just a couple of months, if she’s being honest with herself.

From across the room, Jim clears his throat. “It’s a nice place you’ve got here,” he glances at her with a smile that more closely resembles a smirk. Pleased. “Classy.”

It makes her smile. Maggie tries to remember if there is anything that he likes that she has hanging around in the kitchen. Then she remembers: James Sterling is very, very british.

“Tea?”

A soft hum of approval vibrates the air around them. Jim nods with that same, stupid smiling smirk of his. “Thank you.”

So Maggie makes them tea (Earl Grey because it’s all she has) and they sit in her living room and talk. She mentions the different museums that she’s been to recently, the different artifacts that she has held and authenticated. If the topic seems to bore him he doesn’t let on. He sips at his tea in the chair across from her seat on the couch and listens, nodding where it is appropriate and occasionally adding in his two cents.

She asks about Nate and he frowns, setting down his coffee mug (she doesn’t have tea cups). “He was fired. Weeks ago. I haven’t heard from him since.”

It makes her sad because Nate is a good person, a loving person. He was a great father and husband and while she no longer loves him (she hasn’t loved him for a long time), she still cares about him. Maggie thinks she’ll always care about him to some degree.

She thinks that Sterling will too. Despite their rivalry at work, she knows there was some sort of friendship beneath that. While the motions died along with her son (and Nate’s job and his alcoholism), the feeling has yet to follow.

Sterling clears his throat again. “He’ll turn up again, sooner or later. He always does.”

Maggie nods and that’s the last time they mention Nate. The rest of the conversation flows from art to wine to good books and decent movies. She laughs and he chuckles and it’s good.

It’s better than good.

“We should do this again,” he offers when he stands to go. It’s been almost three hours and it’s getting late.

“We should,” she agrees with a smile, setting down her now cold mug of tea to see him to the door.

There’s a moment - when he’s standing out in the hallway and she’s about to close the door. He looks over his shoulder at her and she stops what she’s doing to look back.

His face is a mask, but it’s a pleasant one.

“Goodbye Maggie.”

He strolls off down the hall and Maggie waits until she hears the dig of the elevator before she shuts her door and sighs.

“Goodbye James.”

 

 


End file.
